Woodsman III & Medics

Edit: Long post, so I put the images in spoiler tags. Skip to the end for conclusion.

Well, the new Woodsman III promotion now gives the unit the ability to heal units in the same tile an extra 15%. Does this stack with any of the Medic promotions?

I made a test using WorldBuilder on a finished game of mine. I got a catapult down to 1.8 health (out of 5), standing still and so eligible for healing.

On its own:



...it healed from 1.8 to 2.3:



With the help of a Medic I unit:



...it healed from 1.8 to 2.8:



With the help of a Woodsman III unit:



...it went to 3.0:



With a Medic III unit:



...it's up to 3.5:



With different Medic III and Woodsman III units:



...it's still only 3.5, the Medic III takes over:



With Medic III near the tile and Woodsman III on the tile:



...it's 3.5 again, same Medic III taking over:



With a Medic I, Woodsman III unit:



...it's 3.5, the equivalent of a Medic III:



And with a Medic III, Woodsman III unit:



...it's up to 4.3:



In conclusion:
- if the Medic and Woodsman III promotions are on different units they don't stack up, the bigger healing "wins"; Medic III has the best healing rate
- if the Medic and Woodsman III promotions are on the same unit they do stack up; Medic I, Woodsman III is equivalent to Medic III, while a Medic III, Woodsman III unit has the best healing rate you can get

This could be a real boost for warrior traits as Woodsman III + Medic III is pretty hard to get (50XP for 7 promotions because of Combat I needed for Medic I). Imperialistic leaders can stack experience from faster generated Great Generals on the super Medic unit. Charismatic leaders don't need as much experience to get it (38XP for 7 promotions). Aggressive leaders give the Melee/Gunpowder units a head start with the free Combat I promotion (37XP needed). And Montezuma's Jaguars get Combat I and Woodsman I as free promotions (26XP needed). Any combination of two warrior traits is also desirable: Boudica's Charismatic/Aggressive (27XP), Genghis Khan's Agg/Imp and Cyrus's Cha/Imp.

The absolute best would be a Jaguar of Boudica of the Aztecs, which would get Woodsman III and Medic III with 20XP. Basically, build the Jaguar (without Barracks!) and attach a Great General.

Anyway, just wanted to post this as I've wondered myself about it but didn't have the time or mood to do the tests before.

Very interesting, thanks!

carl corey said:

In conclusion:
- if the Medic and Woodsman III promotions are on different units they don't stack up, the bigger healing "wins"; Medic III has the best healing rate
- if the Medic and Woodsman III promotions are on the same unit they do stack up; Medic I, Woodsman III is equivalent to Medic III, while a Medic III, Woodsman III unit has the best healing rate you can get

This could be a real boost for warrior traits as Woodsman III + Medic III is pretty hard to get (50XP for 7 promotions because of Combat I needed for Medic I). Imperialistic leaders can stack experience from faster generated Great Generals on the super Medic unit. Charismatic leaders don't need as much experience to get it (38XP for 7 promotions). Aggressive leaders give the Melee/Gunpowder units a head start with the free Combat I promotion (37XP needed). And Montezuma's Jaguars get Combat I and Woodsman I as free promotions (26XP needed). Any combination of two warrior traits is also desirable: Boudica's Charismatic/Aggressive (27XP), Genghis Khan's Agg/Imp and Cyrus's Cha/Imp.

The absolute best would be a Jaguar of Boudica of the Aztecs, which would get Woodsman III and Medic III with 20XP. Basically, build the Jaguar (without Barracks!) and attach a Great General.

Anyway, just wanted to post this as I've wondered myself about it but didn't have the time or mood to do the tests before.

Click to expand...

Thanks for info!

Could you please test one more time, now with a unit having Combat V, Medic III and Woodsman III (healing itself), on enemy land.

P.S. Post #200!

I'll do that later today or tomorrow, I'm going out right now. Have to move a bit after all the "computering".

Thank you for the info.

Very interesting. In the early game, you often end up with a 5 XP Warrior. I guess most people use the Woodsman I & II promotion on him, since his only mission is to explore.

I always thought he would be useless after this, so I often just let him get eaten by a lion or something. But you gave me a brilliant idea!

When you get the Woodsman II Warrior, let him return and save him for later. Later, when you get a great general, let him lead that Warrior = +20 XP and free upgrades.

Actually, I've never bothered using the medic promotions. But now I just have to try this super medic.

Thanks for doing those tests carl_corey! That's very helpful information

@Pikkis: How about not including the entire OP in your quote? You can edit it down slightly and make it easier for everyone else to read the comments. Thanks.

If you're going to test combat V, can you also take a look at the healing in adjacent tiles with medic II/III and woodsman III (on one unit)?
Would be interesting if only the medic effect applies there, or if the woodsman effect is also extended.

Great work!

BTW, anyone else other than me stack healing promotions on their units attached with a Great General?

Underdawg said:

Great work!

BTW, anyone else other than me stack healing promotions on their units attached with a Great General?

Click to expand...

Yes, that's a very good way to use Great Warlord units. The other options, such as city raider/combat promotion stacking tends to get them killed in strokes of bad luck.

My Great Generals always die if I make them a warlord, especially now the improved AI isn't afraid to attack with massive stacks...

frob2900 said:

Yes, that's a very good way to use Great Warlord units. The other options, such as city raider/combat promotion stacking tends to get them killed in strokes of bad luck.

Click to expand...

Yes, that is one reason I use them as so... but also, I find I don't really need a +75% str super-unit because the stacks on Huge maps are usually pretty damn large that 1 super unit hardly makes a difference in a battle between stacks of 15+. Also, when taking a city, why risk your super unit on 75% chance? And if it is 90+% chance, aren't there other units that can take it, then why not use them instead.

Well, I won't do the rest of the tests (Combat IV & V) today, but I just wanted to say that since you can't add too Great Generals to a single unit the best you can get from the second one on is 10XP per GG. So you'll really want the unit to go as high as possible before adding GGs to it. Seeing how you won't really want to attack/defend with it you'll probably get 10XP from barbs and that's it. Even then it will take 3 GGs to get it to all the promotions (50XP total) with a unit that doesn't start with any bonuses or if you're not Charismatic. That's a very high count for a non Imperialistic leader. Any starting bonus means under 40XP total, so 2GGs. The multiple GGs needed means that you'll get at least one other Warlord unit, if not two. I'd use some Leadership-promoted top attackers so that they could fully enjoy the benefits of being Warlords even if they only start with an additional 10XP instead of 20XP.

So Boudica or Monty's Jaguars remain the main benefactors of this improved healing with Khan and Cyrus as close seconds.

I did a test a few days ago where I noticed that a medic I unit and a separate woodsman III unit do combine there healing bonuses for a total extra 25% of healing. So apparently the situation is a bit more complicated and weird than we would expect. In some cases the bonuses stack, in others they don't. It could be a bit bugged.

It might be interesting to post your findings in the strategy article thread about unit healing, especially since your tests are so well documented.

Hehe, my generals always have to lead from the front. Even though the medic idea is a good one, as the game would say "But that goes against everything I stand for". If generals die, then they die gloriously in battle not cowering in a tent, pretending to be a doctor

Why can't the scout get Woodsman III? I know he can't attack but still he'd be a good healer... I just tried and it's not available to him, why not?

I think I did the Woody III & separate Medic I before but forgot to report it. Anyway, I just redid that test and I didn't manage to heal more with Woodsman III unit & separate Medic I unit on the same tile than with Woodsman III. Are you sure you weren't getting any boost for being in your territory or something? All my test have been performed in neutral, but if you want you could set up a few tests in your territory to see if any of this differs. I'll probably test them myself but I don't know when I have the time and I fully expect things to stay the same.

By the way I didn't test what happens if the unit that's healing actually has one on those promotions. I expect it to be a marginally interesting case (so what if your other medic isn't healed?!) but it's something to consider for purposes of completeness. And yeah, I still have the Combat IV and Combat V tests to do.

Edit: short test for Medic I on the catapult (the unit that needs healing). Doesn't stack up with Woodsman III, just as I expected.

Here are the test results for different Medic I and Woodsman III:





...and Medic II and Woodsman III:






They show no change from lone Woodsman III healing.

carl corey said:

I think I did the Woody III & separate Medic I before but forgot to report it. Anyway, I just redid that test and I didn't manage to heal more with Woodsman III unit & separate Medic I unit on the same tile than with Woodsman III. Are you sure you weren't getting any boost for being in your territory or something? All my test have been performed in neutral, but if you want you could set up a few tests in your territory to see if any of this differs. I'll probably test them myself but I don't know when I have the time and I fully expect things to stay the same.

By the way I didn't test what happens if the unit that's healing actually has one on those promotions. I expect it to be a marginally interesting case (so what if your other medic isn't healed?!) but it's something to consider for purposes of completeness. And yeah, I still have the Combat IV and Combat V tests to do.

Click to expand...

It was in neutral terrain and I used barb warriors to do the damage. I of course deleted the test game afterwards.

It could be that one of the healing units (woodsman III or medic I) was the wounded unit, but I don't think so as they would have been promotion healed.

I was using solvers unofficial BTS patch (and not the present version either), but that shouldn't make a difference.

Maybe I will redo the test tomorrow, if I have some time. However, whether I'm right or you're right (and you have done more tests, so you're more likely to be right), it is a good idea to post results in that thread about unit healing as that thread has been the basis for a War Academy article. It's best to get all the information in a location where it will be stored. In this subforum, it will quickly disappear to page 20.

Edit: Now seeing your other tests, there is not much use for me to redo my tests. I probably just made some mistake.

from the looks of it the aztecs/monty's UU got a boost with a Super Jaguar Medic, although I can't see that unit being a healer lmao.